One problem with receiving television signals is the presence of strong adjacent channels surrounding a channel-of-interest. Those adjacent channels are not taken into account when determining the gain of a receiver. By default, therefore, the gain of the two or more variable gain stages of a receiver are set to achieve the best sensitivity for the receiver. Typically, the gain of a first variable gain stage in the receiver is kept at a maximum as long as possible. The following variable gain stage(s) may be used to adjust the signal level according to the input level required by the demodulator. Only when the level of the desired signal becomes too strong is the gain of the first variable gain stage reduced to keep the signal levels within the linear range of the receiver. The point where the gain control is changed from the succeeding variable gain stage(s) to the first variable gain stage is called the “take-over-point” (TOP). However, when using the default TOP in the presence of strong adjacent channels, the input stages of the receiver can be overdriven and the quality of the desired signal can be degraded.